The Vodacom Group has announced that in a bid to oversee all of its operations on the continent, Vodacom South Africa has been formed.

While Vodacom South Africa will still form part of the Vodacom Group, it will operate as a standalone company within the group.

Vodacom South Africa will see Balesh Sharma take on the role of managing director.

“The stellar financial performance of our International Portfolio combined with the added responsibility of managing Vodafone Ghana and accelerating the growth of financial and digital services means that we needed to put the right structure in place to deliver on our ambition of becoming a leading Pan African technology company,” Vodacom Group chief executive officer Shameel Joosub explained.

“This includes the decoupling of Vodacom South Africa as a standalone business,” the CEO continued. “Under Balesh’s leadership, I am confident that the increased focus will leverage the numerous opportunities that exist in South Africa from both our traditional Telco business and our technology-focused growth acceleration units.”

The new Vodacom South Africa managing director has previously occupied positions at Vodafone India where he was chief operation officer and Vodafone Idea where he was the CEO.

The forthcoming MD is an alumni of the Harvard Business School and Mayo College, and holds a Degree in Mechanical Engineering from Engineering College, Kota and an MBA from Podar Institute of Management in Jaipur, India.

From 1st July, Beverly Ngwenya and Sitho Mdlalose will join Sharma on the Vodacom South Africa executive committee as technology director and financial director respectively.

“The new structure will also place heightened emphasis on our international portfolio and new growth areas to ensure that we continue to diversify our revenue streams,” added Joosub.

“What the new structure won’t do is shift our priority away from assisting governments to combat the spread of Covid-19 and with the economic recovery from the health crisis. The safety of our staff and customers remains paramount, as does ensuring we continue to deliver on high customer experience standards,” the Vodacom Group CEO concluded.